Team Velocity is a company that is transforming the automotive industry with technology that digitizes the car buying and vehicle ownership processes. Pulse 2.0 interviewed Team Velocity CEO and founder David Boice to learn more about the company.
David Boice’s Background
What is David Boice’s background? Boice said:
“I’ve been an entrepreneur from an early age. Like most 22-year-olds after college, I was young, hungry, and excited to begin my career. I had grand plans of moving to Chicago and working in the booming pharmaceutical sales industry. But, life is unexpected and doesn’t always go as planned – at the last minute, the job fell through and I needed to quickly pivot. I scoured the newspaper classifieds looking for other types of sales jobs and was told that my personality test results indicated I wouldn’t succeed in sales. After many failed interviews, I was left with one last option. On a cold Friday night in January 1987, I found myself walking into a car dealership for the first time.”
“The company I worked for partnered with dealerships to sell exciting aftermarket products like rust-proofing and paint sealant to customers who had just purchased a car. I had finally made it to my dream job! My days were spent at a tiny desk in the showroom with a flipchart and a manual sales log that I faxed back to the main office at the end of the day. Even though I wasn’t technically employed by a dealership, I exclusively worked at my assigned stores on behalf of my company and fell in love with the fast-paced atmosphere and the people who worked there. After a few months of grinding it out with my flipcharts and stain-proof fabric samples, I realized there had to be a more compelling way to visually market and sell our products. In 1987, PC’s hadn’t been incorporated into dealership operations yet and I saw an opportunity.”
“After 6 months, I decided to venture out on my own and start my first company, AutoMark. My dad was my first business partner and the concept was simple: to create a digital photo catalog of aftermarket products that could be viewed and presented on a PC, along with a database to measure and manage all the sales. It worked so well that the sales teams started asking if I could build something similar for the vehicles themselves. Remember, the internet wasn’t what it is today and the only way you could see what cars a dealership had was to physically go to a dealership and walk around the lot. You couldn’t look at photos of the cars on a computer. If it was raining, it was going to be a slow sales day.”
“In 1993, a little company called Carmax had recently started using touchpad kiosks to search and view inventory in the showroom. We took that concept and built a system that could work for franchised dealerships. The technology made it possible to not only view photos of every car on a kiosk in the showroom but also aggregate inventory data across multi-rooftop locations and track when the cars sold. You could research different models, compare multiple cars, and discover lease vs finance options, there was even an “About Us” section. By 1999, we were perfectly positioned to build an actual website and became the first company to bring the showroom online, empowering consumers to start shopping for a new car at home. Dealers loved it. AutoMark went on to work with 57 of the top 100 dealer groups in the country and the rest is history. I guess those personality tests were wrong after all.”
Formation Of Team Velocity
How did the idea for the company come together? Boice shared:
“After we sold AutoMark to one of the major DMS providers in the early 2000s, I was left with a 10-year non-compete personality that wasn’t cut out to retire at 35. The dot-com boom not only propelled dealership websites but other technologies like email marketing had been popularized as well. Over time, the industry ended up with hundreds of siloed technologies and a growing software and data fragmentation problem. In 2005, I got together with two of my partners at AutoMark and co-founded Team Velocity with the vision to build a singular platform that would integrate these disjointed products, connecting website retailing operations with other dealership marketing strategies to improve the customer’s experience and help dealers grow their business. Amazon and Apple became massive inspirations because of their ability to integrate customer shopping experiences across multiple devices and online. I couldn’t re-enter the automotive primary website space for 10 years, but there was one thing that those websites missed: retention. Every website was the same for every consumer, whether they were a previous customer of the dealership or not. We combined predictive analytics with marketing automation to build online customer shopping portals and personalized campaigns. We quickly became one of the largest direct marketing providers in the industry and the beginnings of our customer experience platform, Apollo, were born. We started adding an array of automated digital advertising solutions and the vision came full circle in 2020 when we launched the final piece of the platform, primary dealership websites.”
Favorite Memory
What has been your favorite memory working for the company so far? Boice reflected:
“My favorite memory would have to be working with our first client. We helped a Hyundai dealership in Baltimore set a national sales record our first month in business and that’s when I knew we were on to something big.”
Core Products
What are the company’s core products and features? Boice explained:
“The heartbeat of Team Velocity is Apollo, the customer experience platform (CXP) that has set a new standard for automotive retailing technology by offering a fully integrated, personalized, and automated solution for dealers. The Apollo CXP seamlessly integrates a dealership’s website, digital advertising, and retention strategies for a connected experience across every marketing touchpoint, ensuring each customer is consistently met with one-to-one targeted messaging throughout the shopping journey. Apollo’s intelligent technology is powered by AI, giving each customer a level of personalization similar to what they would see when shopping at Amazon. Apollo prioritizes the customer experience from the first engagement to the final transaction to lasting loyalty, making it the go-to platform for dealers across the country.”
Challenges Faced
What challenges have Boice and the team faced in building the company? Boice acknowledged:
“CDK Global, a major data and technology provider in the industry, recently experienced a major cyber attack resulting in a severe outage that left dealers vulnerable ahead of the high-sales July 4th holiday season and for several weeks after. While it didn’t affect Team Velocity directly, dealers using CDK products were sent back to the pre-digital era, having to write sales and service orders down on paper, and losing digital functionality for all lead activity and service scheduling.”
“We built Apollo to not only integrate with dealership DMS data, but to back it up daily, so we were able to give our dealers access despite the outage. Not only that, but Apollo has its own native lead management technology, so we could continue feeding quality leads to our dealers throughout the outage, as well as quickly give them access to our service scheduling and digital retailing tools. Every Apollo product is turnkey, so we could quickly alleviate the outage stressors and fill the void, further strengthening the relationships we’ve built across the industry. This was a significant reminder of the importance of data security, and we quickly hired an external firm to conduct an exhaustive audit of our platform to ensure we are taking all measures to keep our clients and their data safe.”
Evolution Of Team Velocity’s Technology
How has the company’s technology evolved since launching? Boice noted:
“Since launching Apollo in 2015, we’ve been constantly innovating and evolving to remain at the forefront of automotive retailing technology. Integrating AI with Apollo has enabled the next level of personalization within the shopping experience, enabling dealers to seamlessly give each customer one-on-one attention.”
“Over the years, we’ve also come across some website applications that frankly weren’t up to par with our standards – a chat tool that doesn’t have the capability to schedule an appointment or provide personalized trade-in options, a financing tool that doesn’t calculate accurate payments. Our first thought – we can do better. We’ve created several applications natively built into Apollo that make life easier for both dealers and customers and more importantly, provide a more holistic view of the customer’s journey and engagement. For example, Assistant.AI is our version of a chat tool that can automatically identify a customer and proactively communicate with them with personalized messaging. We’ve also incorporated a more robust CRM system to automate sales processes and better prioritize opportunities.”
Significant Milestones
What have been some of the company’s most significant milestones? Boice cited:
“Since launching our website solution in 2020, Team Velocity has become the fastest-growing technology provider in the industry with over 20 OEM program certifications. 2023 was a landmark year, kicked off with a major strategic partnership announcement with FordDirect. Together, we launched a program called Platform Solution, making FordDirect the first to certify an integrated platform in an OEM program, offering significant integration between the OEM and its retailers. We also earned 81% growth in website adoption in 2023, the highest of our competitors by a sizable margin.”
Customer Success Stories
After asking Boice about customer success stories, he highlighted:
“One of our longest-tenured clients, Paragon Honda, is an NYC-based dealer that shares a strong passion for technological innovation. Our relationship started back in 2008, working together as true partners to continue innovating and pushing the limits of what automotive retailing technology can do. Paragon’s first goal was to become the #1 Honda store in the state. Over those 16+ years, we’ve achieved some amazing milestones for both Paragon and Team Velocity, but the pinnacle was seeing Paragon become the #1 Honda dealer in the world in 2023. It has been an absolute honor to stand alongside Paragon and help them earn this incredible achievement – but don’t expect us to stop there.”
Funding
When asking Boice about the company’s revenue details, he revealed:
“Revenue is expected to be around $250 million in 2024 with a 35%+ growth rate. We are proud to remain a privately-held, debt-free company, with no outside investors.”
Total Addressable Market
What total addressable market (TAM) size is the company pursuing? Boice assessed:
“The total addressable market is estimated to be over $20 billion for US-based dealerships.”
Differentiation From The Competition
What differentiates the company from its competition? Boice affirmed:
“What sets us apart from our competition is our ability to solve any problem at a dealership with the help of our technology and our people. Our people are the best in the business, and with the power of the best technology platform behind us, we’re able to offer holistic and creative solutions to calm any and all dealership concerns. Our genuine care for our dealers means that their problems are our problems, and Apollo is always the answer.”
Future Company Goals
What are some of the company’s future company goals? Boice concluded:
“Growth. While we continue to expand in our primary market, US-based car dealerships, we are planning an expansion into the Canadian market and to re-enter adjacent verticals, such as RV, Marine, and Powersports. At the rate we are growing we will double the size of our business over the next 2 years, so it’s imperative that we maintain the quality of our onboarding and support. We continue to invest in our operations, recently opening a bi-lingual support center in El Paso, Texas, which we anticipate will become home to 60 new associates. Of course, innovation remains at our core and we have a lengthy product roadmap to support customer demands, such as a new CRM and additional AI solutions.”
